It must be the season for government entities to be spreading consultation documents that relate to outdoor recreation. Here’s a quick summary of three particular consultations that are going on at the moment about legislation that might affect outdoor recreation.
Tag: government policies
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Protecting the landscape in the Tararua District (maybe)
As has recently been pointed out by Robb, who spends a lot of time tramping in the Ruahines, several large energy companies have recently made submissions on the proposed Tararua District Plan. The companies concerned are Genesis Energy, TrustPower, Meridian Energy, and Mighty River Power. Each of the energy companies has made one of the most detailed submissions to the proposed plan. Some of their comments look interesting as far as the Ruahine and Tararua ranges are concerned.
The Tararua District Council has published the proposed plan on its website. In addition, comments received about the proposed plan are also available for download, either as a summary or as a complete scan of every submission.
The Tararua District is already known for the Tararua Wind Farm, which is operated by TrustPower and sits in the wind tunnel between the Tararua and Ruahine Ranges. This is probably why the energy companies have such a vested interest in the region. As Robb pointed out, however, the changes proposed by the energy companies might result in changes to the District Plan which make it much easier for very large wind turbines to be built, and which could potentially affect the skyline of the Tararua Range and the Ruahine Range, whatever that might entail.
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Even more track consultations for Wellington
If you’re like me and spend much of your spare time wandering around local tracks in the Wellington region, you might be interested to know that the Wellington City Council is currently consulting on its Draft Recreation Activities Policy, which governs how the WCC balances the needs of walkers, cyclists, horse riders, 4WD enthusiasts, and crazy mountain runners throughout Wellington’s track network. Consultation is open until Monday 22nd September, and an Online Submission Form is being provided.
The consultation covers tracks throughout most of Wellington’s Town Belt such as the Tinakori Hill, parts of the Southern Walkway, parts of the Skyline Walkway, Wrights Hill, Te Kopahou Reserve, and a few others. Actually after a brief scan, at least part of the proposals look to be opening up certain areas to mountain bikes which frequently get used by people on mountain bikes already.
If you’re interested in the tracks around the area, it might be worth your while to have a browse of the draft policy and make a submission, either in support of the proposals or not. Additional related WCC policies that are up for consultation during the same time period are the Draft Walking Policy and the Draft Cycling Policy, which respectively aim to frame the policies around encouraging walking and cycling in Wellington and making them safe.
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Recreation Survey for Rimutaka Forest Park
DOC has posted an online survey regarding recreation in the Orongorongo and Catchpool Valleys in Rimutaka Forest Park, which is worth a look (and submission) if you happen to have an interest in the area. More information about these valleys is available on DOC’s information page.
The catchment is very accessible to Wellington and probably one of the most commonly visited forest parks in the area. As well as being popular for daywalks, tramping and hunting, it’s full of private batches — some of which are quite extensive, particularly along the Orongorongo River, and is accessible by 4WD from around the coast. No doubt there are a lot of interests.
The Poneke Area Office is also planning a couple of information evenings, and instructions about how to become involved in these are also available on the survey page.
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Consultation of building codes for New Zealand Backcountry Huts
As of a few weeks ago, it’s been possible to make a submission about proposed changes to the building code as it applies to New Zealand Backcountry Huts. If you have an interest in this kind of thing, I’d strongly suggest making a submission, even if you mostly agree with the proposal. The deadline for receiving submissions is Monday 23rd June 2008, and the consultation document is available online thanks to New Zealand’s Department of Building and Housing.
A few weeks ago when I wrote my trip report about visiting Cattle Ridge, I made a comment about the apparent absurdity of DOC’s decision to remove a bunk from the 6 bunk hut. This is apparently due to some ambiguity in the various New Zealand building codes which imply that these days, certain kinds of structures that are intended for a certain number of people require a certain number of fire exits, as well as various other things that seem more suited to populated areas. The consequence? Well somewhere along the line, someone decided that back-country huts with 6 or more bunks would require at least 2 fire exits. Because the design of many back-country huts makes it impractical to add an additional fire exit (there’s simply not enough wall space), DOC adopted the policy, in some cases, of removing one of the beds to turn 6 bunk huts into 5 bunk huts. [Edit, 19/3/2012: It turns out the sixth bunk in Cattle Ridge Hut may have been missing for other reasons, but there remain other examples of Doc staff removing bunks from huts to meet safety standards.]
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Legally winding through the Kaimanawa Range
Last weekend I was on a trip with the Wellington Tongue & Meats to Kaimanawa Forest Park. I was going to post my thoughts about the whole private land thing as part of the trip report. My thoughts ended up being quite long, however, so I thought I might post them separately. (The report regarding the trip which inspired this is also available.) This post is mostly a collection of background material that I’ve looked up to do with getting access to the area of the park that we visited near the Urchin road-end, which may be useful in some way to others planning something similar, and is completely open for discussion since I haven’t been looking at this for long.
A very brief background of this post is that the Kaimanawa Range itself has a big hole of private land cut out of the middle of it, much of which is mountanous and generally looks interesting. Public regions around the outside are administered by the New Zealand Department of Conservation. The majority of the land is Maori land (according to Map 6 of the maps included in the park management plan), and much of that land is leased to third parties. On our particular trip, parts of the private land located near where we wanted to go are leased by Air Charter Taupo, which exclusively flies hunters into the region for a price.